Tuesday, May 29, 2018

Queen of Angst Returns

Happy belated Memorial Day if you are American.... which seems weird to say... "Happy" Memorial Day, when the point is to reflect upon and remember military members who have died in service....

Um... well.... either way....

The week has been a bit chaotic thanks to Memorial Day. Sadly, it has sort of become synonymous with "Great Sales and/or Barbecue Weekend." So we were SLAMMED at work. Leaving me with roughly... 45min all week to write.

Although, who else has time to write during their normal 9-to-5? So I guess I shouldn't be grumbling. Still, it left me with a lot fewer hours to work with than I was hoping for, and I wasn't exactly using them well.

I know I already mentioned this last week, but I wanted to introduce the next akuma in chapter 8 of "Peeping Tomcat." So I spent a lot of last week working on him. I mean, A LOT of time....

As I also mentioned, I was then trying to use what I came up with to write a "behind the scenes" short, much like what I did for Mimicker to help me sort things out. Problem being that I was spending too much time writing that, and not enough writing the next chapter of "Peeping Tomcat."

Normally, slacking off isn't that bad. I mean, it's still bad. It still takes me a lot of time to edit each chapter, but that's all I'm doing: editing. I had to actually WRITE this chapter this time, as well as have time to edit it so it's at the same level as the other chapters. It wouldn't be fair to my readers if they got a sub-par chapter because I slacked off.

I had also unofficially started posting shorts on my Tumblr every three days, and Wednesday would be the next day to post something. Things were getting crazy.

So I ended up giving up the shorts. Yes, it was great seeing the love of my stories getting likes and reblogs on Tumblr, but I had a priority: my main story. What was the point of getting likes, reblogs, traffic, any of that stuff, if I had no story to promote? I had to focus on that.

I spent a lot of Wednesday getting the nuts and bolts of the story sorted out, and then Thursday trying to finish it. I didn't do too well, because I was also exhausted from work, and we kept having impromptu guests. I love guests. I love people. I'm an extrovert. But even I got to a point where I want to say "Gaaah! Get out of my house! I need to write!"

In fact, I think I DID say that at one point. Thankfully, Hubby simply went on a Pokemon Go walk, so it all worked out. There are multiple ways to support the artist in your life, peeps.

Anyway, on Thursday I stayed up until about 1am before my eyes fogged over. That was my white flag. I had to go to sleep, and since I couldn't really see my computer screen anyway, it seemed as good a time as any.

Getting back up around 6am, I rushed through the last few hours of writing, editing, and posting my latest chapter. All while also taking Hubby into work before having to get ready for work myself.

I was exhausted, but I had done it. I wasn't even late! My 8:30am chapter update schedule stayed in tact. Although, my promoting of it didn't. I just ran out of time to do my normal promotional circuit - my personal FB page, the fanfic FB group, Twitter, and now Tumblr - and still get to work on time. So I had to wait until my lunch break at 1:15pm to promote my story.

Speaking of, have you had a chance to read the latest chapter yet? If not, don't forget that there are three convenient sites you can read it on.

FanFiction         ArchiveOfOurOwn         DeviantArt

Despite the struggles, I think I did fairly alright for myself.
FFN: 672 views, 1 faves, 2 followers, and 2 reviews
AO3: 196 views and 5 kudos
DA: 10 views

Total Results: 878 views, 6 faves, 2 followers, and 2 reviews

Tumblr Notes: 2 likes for my promotional post

The comments:
  1. Man this was an epic fight scene in my head! :o I can see Chat just leaping onto Marinette's balcony later on that day since he is so distraught and to check on her, while she tries to find out what's wrong with him.
So glad you updated btw ~

  2. So much angst!
I'm actually pretty impressed that I received the amount of views I did within the first 24hrs. Mainly because of that delay in promoting. That may have skewed the stats a bit, and I'll probably wonder for a while still what my stats would have looked like if I got to promoting on time. Oh well...

Those comments made the struggle worth it. I mean... "epic fight"? Me? I wrote a fight scene that someone thought was "epic"? Also, that "so glad you updated" made me smile.

I'm glad too, reader.
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
That second comment also made me laugh. I mean, I AM the Queen of Angst. Haha. I'm hoping the angst was at least appreciated. I'm assuming so based on the simple-sentence review. Even if it wasn't, I'm going to pretend.


So, someone in the fanfiction FB group asked if she should expect more or fewer views this weekend. On the one hand, most Americans had a three-day weekend, which meant more free-time to do things like read fanfiction. On the other hand, Americans could be slammed at work - like I was - or be otherwise busy with things such as family trips and/or barbecues to fill that three-day weekend.

Another member responded that most people have other things they do on the weekend to take advantage of having days off, and so views are always slow over those few days. Said member also stated that was why he never posted over a weekend. Most views come in on weekdays.

I always saw the opposite. Maybe it's because my story gets buried by other new stories and updates by Monday, but my view count seems to drop to a crawl after the weekend. The stats thus far for the week, post the initial 24hrs, seems to follow that trend:
FFN: 1096 views, 4 faves, 8 followers, and 4 reviews
AO3: 295 views and 13 kudos
DA: 12 views and 1 fave

Total Results: 1403 views, 18 faves, 8 followers, and 4 reviews

Tumblr Notes: I got a third like....

One of the two new comments
(see below for Jowy's):
  1. The poor kitty needs to talk to his lady"s" quick before he gets injured.
     (Another lovely comment from cassy1994)
In other words, here are the stats from 8:30am Saturday until now:
FFN: 424 views, 3 faves, 6 followers, and 2 new reviews
AO3: 99 views and 8 kudos
DA: 2 views and the new fave

Total Results: 525 views, 12 faves, 6 followers, and 2 reviews

Tumblr Notes: 1 new like
According to my email notifications from FFN, 106 of those views, 2 of those follows, 1 of those faves, and cassy's review, were all from yesterday and earlier today. The rest were from the weekend. While I can't track the views on AO3 the same way I can on FFN, I can at least say that half of those new kudos came from either yesterday or this morning. I have no way of tracking DA without physically doing so myself.

So.... like I said.... my stories peter off once the weekend ends. I don't know if it's because new stories flood the sites on Monday, and mine gets buried, or if different fandoms have different reading trends, or if that one fanfic group member just has no clue what he's talking about. But I think I have enough proof to keep up my Friday updates, even once I'm done with "Peeping Tomcat."

Anway, going back to touch upon Jowy's Pixie's review. I'm beginning to love seeing the names cassy1994 and Jowy's Pixie in my email notifications.
Jowy's Pixie: Wow, up until 8:30 in the morning? I hope you're okay! Please get some sleep and don't worry about us! o_O
         Also, CALLED IT! I knew he'd probably end up being akumatized! I totally get what you mean about trying to think of akumas though. It's such hard work and I have no idea how Astruc and his team manage to do it either. I'm always tearing my hair out trying to think of something. But you nailed it pretty well, the motivations were very believable and understandable with a decent build up.
         Poor Chat Noir throughout that entire battle, so distracted by thoughts of Marinette. Oh dear oh dear, the poor boy really is whipped and he has no idea. I just want to leap into this story and give him a good shake, he's so clueless. I felt so sorry for him at the end of the chapter, thinking he was nothing more but a sidekick and didn't deserve to be by Ladybug's side. I have a feeling he might turn to Marinette for comfort over that. I just hope that Ladybug/Marinette can reassure him that that's not the case at all.
         Once again, this chapter was a very enjoyable read. I'm really looking forward to the next chapter to see what happens. As always, this was very well written and I really love the detail that you go into, describing the world around them and the thoughts and emotions that Chat/Adrien is experiencing. Keep up the fantastic work!
I guess in my sleepy daze Friday morning I didn't express myself properly. I did reassure Jowy's that I didn't pull an all-nighter. While it wasn't top-notch self-care, since it was barely 5hrs of sleep, I do make sure to not push myself too much. Besides, once in a blue moon should be fine, right?

I did appreciate the sentiment of "don't worry about us! o_O" though. With all the rabid fans out there always whining "when are you going to update?" it is nice to know that there are still decent fans out there as well, who know you need to focus on you first and this hobby second.

And of COURSE I do keep this hobby second.... totally.... absolutely....
Koko Facebook sticker
by Hanasake Pictures Inc
Which is why I also went back and finished that side-story about Michel's transformation into Terravenger.

"I am Terravenger"
On FanFiction         On Archive Of Our Own           On DeviantArt

I wanted to have this up on Friday as well as a sort of "bonus chapter" but I couldn't get far enough into it to have it ready to publish. I tried again Saturday, and got a good chunk done, but I also didn't have much spare time. Sunday I had to drop Hubby off at work super early in the morning, so I had about four hours to myself.

So THAT was when I got the story nearly done. I was about three paragraphs away from finishing when I realized that I had to be at work in about 20min, and I still hadn't gotten dressed or fixed my hair!

Yup. TOOOOOOTALLY a hobby that doesn't take priority in my life. I have my priorities straight....

When I got home from work I was so hangry and exhausted I just gobbled down dinner and passed out while Hubby and Omnibladestrike went on a Pokemon Go raid. When the guys got back we hung out, and Omni talked about how he expanded a bit on his fanfic. That was the extent of our "writing date" though since I was still dazed.

It wasn't until after he left at about 10pm that I went back to write the closing paragraphs of "I am Terravenger" and edited it.

It went live right around midnight, and then I crashed after promoting it.

Not even 24hrs later, I already got a comment on both my FFN and AO3 postings. They both made me chuckle. Warning, they both contain a spoiler.

On FFN: "Of course that's what happened. Dammit, Roger."

On AO3: "I'd been wondering just what had caused Michel to akumatise (even though it was obvious he would). Wasn't expecting it to be Roger's hair-trigger fine-writing fingers, though. I guess he HAS been building up a tally in Season 2, though..."
Know what I love the most about that AO3 review? The fact that the person had "been wondering" about Michel's akumatizing. That means Draxynnic is a reader of "Peeping Tomcat." Yay. Also, they posted at 12:38am on Monday morning... which means they pretty much saw, read, and commented on the story right after I posted it. Double cool.
Hacker Boy Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc
Anyway, add "I am Terravenger" to the three shorts I posted up on Tumblr, and I think I hit my goal of writing outside my main WIPs each month.

OH! And I did write a fifteen-minute practice piece during one of my "writing dates" with Omni a couple of weeks back. I never did go back to edit and publish that. I'll have to see if I can find time...

Speaking of, I ran out of time last week, so I didn't get to let you guys know this. While out watching the second Deadpool movie, Hubby found Pop Vinyls of me and Ronoxym. So naturally I had to buy them.


Looks just like us. 😉
Another thing I didn't have a chance to talk about - which semi relates to Ron since we went to watch "Ready Player One" together with our spouses - is how I'm doing with my reading challenge.

Let's see, shall we?
Sadly, I have to update this list. I'm so used to Riordan writing a five-part series I didn't even notice that he wasn't going to continue with Magnus Chase. Makes sense, it ended nicely. I guess I just wasn't ready to let go, considering I was liking that series more than the Apollo one. It's probably my love of snarky first-person protagonists....

Anyway, seems Magnus Chase was only a three-part series, much like the Kane Chronicles. However, no longer needing to tag-team stories but having mastered the art of releasing a "spring" and "fall" book, I'll have the fourth story in the Apollo series in... October, probably, based on past release patterns.

As far as how I've been doing with the books I actually have on this list? Well, I'm almost half-way through "The Burning Maze." I FEEL like I'm behind since "Ready Player One" took about six weeks or so to re-read, but thankfully I was already ahead. As long as I finish "The Burning Maze" before the end of June I'm still good.

Speaking of taking over a month to re-read "Ready Player One," the reason was because I was going at it with a very critical eye. I started off just seeing what was different between the movie and novel, but it devolved into something more as I really paid attention to the actual structure of the story.

Let's start with the movie adaptation, though, because ho-lee-smokes was a lot changed for the movie.

I mean, I knew it would be changed slightly, but with Ernest Cline writing both the novel and the screenplay, I was hoping for a much more faithful adaptation. Even when I was watching the movie I thought "wow... this... is different." Ron and I even had a playful but heated debate about it.

I have to say though, much like with "Coraline," I think I prefer the movie version. True, there are things that were better in the book... um.... mostly the character development of all the side characters. Pretty much none of that made it to the movie, and that sucks majorly.

On the flipside, the movie gave Art3mis more involvement and badassery? She basically took the reins for some of Wade's storyline; spreading it out and sharing the wealth a bit. Same with Wade's computer/programming genius shifting to Aech in order to fill out that character a bit more. Even out the value and necessity of the members of the High Five instead of skewing everything towards Wade.

Which brings me to why I think I preferred the movie, while I still love the novel.

On the first read, there were glaring flaws, mostly dealing with time continuity. Anyone who read my blog two years ago might remember me raging about it. I also talked about some plot and character missed opportunities I wished Cline had taken. All-in-all, though, I thought the novel deserved an 8.5 out of 10.

Upon the second read, however, especially with the notes I was taking....
God, I'm such a nerd....
...well... I think I'm giving RPO a 7.5 out of 10 now. It just became so obvious that this was his first novel. The story is still exciting. I still love it. The 80s nerd culture is fantastic. I still laughed. It was still a page-turner. I will probably re-read this book a few more times. So don't get me wrong on any of that. I still highly recommend it, and it's still a great romp.

All that said, I have to say I'm a bit disappointed in the novel's storytelling techniques, especially now that I saw more of the potential showcased in the movie. It was like Cline went through the screenplay of his novel and realized "shoot! I need to rework this." In other words? The novel was a great first draft, but there needed to be a lot of reworking to get a truly excellent story, and all that improving ended up changing a LOT of the plot.

Yes, there is a heart-wrenching bit that was ignored by the movie, and some social commentary as well. The book will always be better than the movie because of that. Same with side-character development, as I already said. The thing the movie does better though, is that WADE gets development. HE has real trials.

Wade in the book? Well, he basically has the classic case of character plot armor. He's the one telling the story, so you KNOW nothing happens to him, but other stories - such as the Percy Jackson or Magnus Chase stories - have the same first-person flaw, and yet you still worry about their safety. You still wonder HOW they will get out of the problem.

Wade, though? Any sort of danger he's in is written in a sentence or two before moving on:
As my ship blasted its way skyward, I began to take heavy fire from several directions. But I was lucky. My ship was fast, and my shields were top-of-the-line, so they managed to hold up long enough for me to reach orbit. But they failed a few seconds later, and the Vonnegut's hull suffered an alarming amount of damage in the handful of seconds it took me to make the jump to light speed.

It was a close call. The bastards almost got me.

-pg 232
Did they, Wade? Did they?

I bet you didn't feel worried at all for him, did you? You didn't have the TIME to. He got away too quickly, and any danger he was in was summed up in a sentence or two. Plus, you'd be surprised how many times the phrase "I was lucky" or some variation of it is used throughout this story. This kid should have been playing the lottery while searching for Halliday's Easter Egg. He may not have needed to be a gunter after all, with the luck he has. Plus, did Wade really DO anything to get out of danger, or prevent himself from being injured? I mean, aside from throwing a lot of money into precautionary items?

The book was basically "look how awesome this kid is, but he's going to be totes low-key about it. #humblebrag" with a plot of "oh look! A puzzle to figure out!" There's a little bit of a race element as well, but the villain gets the lead with fourteen chapters left to go, and the "end game" takes up the entire third act - about 11 chapters - and roughly a week within the confines of the story.

AGAIN, "READY PLAYER ONE" IS A HIGHLY ENJOYABLE BOOK. PLEASE DO NOT LET ME CONVINCE YOU OTHERWISE. GO READ IT. TRUST ME.

But it is still obvious it is the freshman work of an author. Same goes for my re-reading of the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. It's a good read, but once you take a more critical eye to it, the flaws are pretty obvious.

To be fair, though. They are still published, professional authors. Whereas I am not. Also, Paolini wrote Eragon while he was still in high school soooooooo.....

And my characters kind of have "plot armor" as well. I just can't seem to ever injure them. The best I have is the angst.... which is probably why I am the queen.

My characters won't so much as break a nail, but they'll get so twisted up in a social/romantic web that - hopefully - the reader is still concerned and wonders how the protagonist is going to get out of the mess.

Speaking of, I think it's time for me to put Adrien through a deeper level of existential crisis. Catch you all next week.

Tuesday, May 22, 2018

Busy Writing Week

Man, I love being able to sit on my front porch and write again. I just wish it wasn't about to rain, because it's actually a bit chilly right now. I need to find my fingerless gloves. Get all early 2000's up in here....

Speaking of early 2000s, I've been on a bit of a writing streak lately. I'm coming up with random little story shorts, mostly inspired by music, just like I used to in high school. It's fun being back, but I'll talk more about those little drabbles later. First, we have to of course talk about "Peeping Tomcat."

I'm past my half-way point one way or another - if I stay at 14 chapters or expand out to 15 - as of this Friday. This was probably the second or third chapter I thought of as I expanded my original writing practice short out into what is now "Peeping Tomcat." Even though it was one of my oldest written chapters, I was editing this baby right up until I went to bed on Thursday.

Mainly because I needed to add a new element to the chapter, and in doing so I ended up switching up the chapter title. I never really was a fan of the working title "Soup" anyway. It just didn't seem to fit in with the other titles I came up with thus far.

Another snaffu? I whoopsied with my story's saved files again. Because I'm awesome.
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
Ever since I lost most of PT during NaNo, I have tried to be good at saving in multiple places, although I do keep forgetting about re-uploading to Google Docs.... Anyway, I have my main laptop now that I got a replacement hard drive put in last month. I also still use my netbook, mostly when I'm writing at work since the netbook fits in my work bag nicely. Then there is my external drive, my NaNoWriMo "My Novel" flash drive bracelet, and Google Docs.
Unfortunately, it seems this item has been discontinued.
Well, the way I have been doing things goes like this:
  • Write at home and save to laptop
  • Save copy to the external and flash drives
  • Go to work, and transfer flash drive file to netbook; overwriting the file already there
  • Continue to write at work and save to netbook
  • Save copy to flash drive; overwriting the file already there
  • Go home, and transfer flash drive file to laptop; overwriting the file already there
  • Rinse and repeat.
It's been working for me. I've gotten into the flow.

Then Wednesday happened.

I had been writing at work for about 20min before I realized I just opened up the flash drive file instead of my normal routine of dumping the file onto the netbook hard drive first. So I figured "easy fix" and just Saved As to the netbook. Normally, when you "save as" you then work on that new file: either the name changes or the file destination does, depending on what the "save as" difference is.

So, since I selected the netbook's old version of the PT file, and THOUGHT I clicked "save as" and yes to overwriting the existing file, I was under the assumption everything else I did that day was on the netbook hard drive file.

Then at the end of the work day I saved the hour-plus worth of work I had done throughout the day, and closed my netbook. Only to realize "you idiot! You forgot to save the new file back onto the flash drive." So I promptly started my netbook back up to finish my routine.

A moment too late, I realized the "date modified" for the new file was 5/9.... not 5/16 like it should have been. The file I was apparently working on throughout the rest of the work day was still off the flash dive; I never switched to the netbook hard drive version. Unfortunately, I had already told the netbook version to overwrite the file on the flash drive.

Meaning I just saved an old version of PT over the freshly saved new version I had been working on all day....

I'm good at this.
Upside? I more-or-less knew what I did for the edits, and what I wanted for the additions I put in.

Downside? This was one of those rare instances where I think I did a better job with my first go at writing the scene than I did on my "I only remember the best bits" rewrite from scratch. I couldn't remember the exact wording of my first go, but I remembered it being better than what I ended up with.

I then spent most of my Thursday off trying to edit, edit, and edit some more to try to get everything back to the way I had it before my oopsie. I think I got close. Regardless, I think I did well enough that my readers have been enjoying the latest chapter. What do you think?

FanFiction         ArchiveOfOurOwn         DeviantArt

The chapter has been weird with its reception. On the one hand, it hasn't felt as popular as the others since I haven't been getting as many notifications about faves/kudos, reviews, and follows/bookmarks as I normally do past that first day. On the flipside, this chapter seems to be provoking the most comments... and all within the first twenty-four hours:
FFN: 642 views, 3 faves, 3 followers, and 4 reviews!
AO3: 131 views, 3 kudos, and 1 review
DA: Only 11 views

Total Results: 784 views, 6 faves, 3 followers, and 5 reviews

Reviews from the first 24hrs:
  1. Kitty's got quite the crush. I can't stop watching him watching her! Agh! lol
(AO3 comment about chapter 6)
  2. The green activist looks like an akuma-victim-to-be. It's good Chat Noir was friendly and signed his petition.
  3. Hopefully he's starting to get a clue. Excellent chapter as always!
(One of my repeat reviewers)
  4. Of course he would be slow at it. I really enjoyed this and look forward to more.
(Another Cassy1994 review)
  5. Also, another lengthy review from Jowy's Pixie. See below
So, the numbers for the first 24hrs seems pretty on par with previous weeks, but that spike of five reviews! That's the most I've received outside the initial nine on the first chapter. The only other chapters that received more than one new review within 24-hrs of posting were "Normal" at four reviews, and "Mimicker" at three.

The real kicker here though is that this was a "no new Miraculous episodes" week. Normally those are my "slow" weeks. So, having five reviews, even if one was for an earlier chapter, is pretty neat.

And speaking of "pretty neat" reviews, this is Jowy's:
Jowy's Pixie: Ah yes, Adrien sure is dense sometimes when it comes to his feelings for Marinette. However, it was indeed nice to see in this chapter that he's starting to recognize that what he is feeling for Marinette may be slightly more than friendship. It must be so confusing for him though. To be in love with both Ladybug and Marinette while not knowing that they are the same person. I'm already twitching anxiously at the thought of the chaos this could possibly cause for his already confused emotional state.
          I felt so sorry for Adrien the whole time I was reading this chapter. You managed to capture his emotional turmoil perfectly and I was totally invested in his thoughts and feelings. Adrien was so in character this entire chapter. Marinette was also so adorable making him some of her great-uncle's soup and trying to give it to him. Just a shame Adrien wasn't there to receive it and also the fact that Gabriel obviously still would not have let them in. Because I think that could have led to some lovely, cute exchanges between the pair. Ah well, Gabriel will be Gabriel. Why do I have a feeling that the environmentalist guy will become an akuma victim? I dunno, just a feeling, but I could end up being wrong.
          Once again, another amazing chapter. I was so excited when I saw the update. This story is very quickly becoming one of my favourites at the moment. I'm really enjoying reading it. Keep up the fantastic work and I look forward to more. Good luck!
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
D'aaw.... Joxy.... *blush* I already told them thank you for the kind review, but I feel the need to thank them again.

Anyway, the weekend continued, and spilled over until you have today. While the stats didn't increase all that much with regards to faves, follows, or reviews, my views did jump up quite a bit.
FFN: 988 views, 4 faves, 6 followers, and the aforementioned 4 reviews
AO3: 220 views, 4 kudos, and that 1 review
DA: Still only 16 views. No faves this week thus far.

Total Results: 1224 views, 8 faves, 6 followers, and 5 reviews

Tumblr Notes: 1 like, and Cyhyr reblogging it....
Yeah.... My first Tumblr promotion for my chapter updates - last week's "Chapter 7: Confusion" - ended up with 16 notes. All of them were likes, including one like by ChibiSunnie. This past week, though? Just that one like - by someone who doesn't follow me, so... cool? - and Cy's reblog of it to try to help me promote. Chibi hasn't really been on Tumblr this past week, so I'm sure she'll like and/or reblog once she's back on. Until then? I'm stuck at two notes. Bummer. The ironic thing was that I was sure I'd have a better turnout after all the other writing I did this week.

Oh, you forgot that, didn't you? Yup, I did start this post off by commenting on all the writing I worked on this week. It wasn't all for "Peeping Tomcat" though.

Yes, a big portion of it was, which helped with this eighth chapter, and I'll circle back to that, but I've also done some drabbles. I spent so much time letting my mind wander to hopefully come up with the next akuma attack for my story that said mind wandered into a couple of new plot bunny ideas.

You already know the first one. I shared it last week.


As of this posting, it has 11 likes, and 2 reblogs. One of those reblogs was by one of the people who liked it, and they added "Oh my god! So good!" to their reblogging. Cyhyr also chimed in with "Yaaaas continue." So, that's at least 13 people who have read it since I posted it on the 14th....

Then, three days later on the 17th, I woke up with another little short in my head. I have no clue where it came from. I literally woke up with it already pretty fully brewed.


It is a cute little Lukanette story. In other words, a story using the romantic paring of Marinette and a potential new love interest as of episode 12: Luka. Just to keep in mind: Luka, and episode 12, premiered with the USA Netflix release on March 30th. Same day I premiered "Peeping Tomcat."

Which means the fandom has known of Luka - and have either loved him, hated him, or became indifferent to his presence - for roughly 8 weeks. In that same time we have only gotten up to the 15th episode, but Luka returned for a brief cameo in the most recent one. Point being that in two months and only four episodes - including his own - Luka has become a very popular, albeit also polarizing, character. All of this may play a factor in how this story was received.

Namely, the most popular original post on my Tumblr.

As of this posting, it is up to 35 likes, and 3 reblogs, two of which were people who already liked it. Meaning at least 36 people have read it. On top of that, 29 of the likes and all 3 reblogs occurred roughly within the first 48hrs that it was up.

To kind of keep up with this pattern of one new drabble every three days - completely unintentionally, by the way - I posted yet another drabble on Sunday. I guess that means I need another new drabble by tomorrow to keep this up...

Anyway, this was a longer drabble, clocking in at 4 pages/2000 words. A lot longer than I originally thought it would be.

For a few days I had been listening to the song "Play Me Like a Violin" by Stephan. I'm pretty sure I've shared it before, but here it is again.
I knew I wanted to write a romance story based on this song, but I couldn't really lock down what to write. Then, over the weekend, I thought: Young Gabriel Agreste meeting his wife Emilie. Considering the show all but confirmed the fan theory that Gabriel "Hawk Moth" Agreste is a villain of circumstance, doing what he's doing to get his wife back, a la Batman's Mr. Freeze, I knew the love between them had to be special. Normally, that kind of passion leads to the image of sweet, playful but mostly innocent couples. But why? Especially with one episode showing that Emilie starred in at least one independent film, maybe she was more outgoing, charismatic, dramatic - which Gabriel all but confirmed in an episode - or just straight up had a bit of a wild side. Which is where Adrien's Chat Noir personality comes from.

It all clicked then. What if Emilie was that "stranger in a white dress" sung about in "Play Me Like a Violin"? Granted, I wasn't comfortable with having Gabriel taking ecstasy and having a random fling with the first person who made him feel good, but that doesn't mean they still couldn't have a semi-random hook-up.


The whole thing ended up fairly PG in the end, but I still enjoyed what I came up with. I also have more of the story brewing in the back of my mind, much like I did with "Fused Akuma."

So far, it has had 12 likes since it went up just before 3:30pm Sunday. One of those people also reblogged it with the tags:
  #OOOOOOO I LOVED IT!!   #SUCH CUTIESS

"Stranger in a White Dress" was also reblogged by a second person who made me chuckle with their tags:
#CUTE AF   #GABRIEL AGRESTE   #EMILIE AGRESTE
#MRS AGRESTE   #AHHH  #I LOVE IT SO   #THOUGH I DON'T KNOW IF SHE'LL CALL ?? #THAT'S WHAT GIRLS DO U KNOW
I mean, I WAS going to have her call him, but now I'm intrigued.... what if she doesn't? Or, rather, what state is she in when she does? Plot bunnies abound!

Another fun thing about this week in Tumblr-world was that I got my first "ask."

Basically, for those who don't know, there's a way for you to put a link on your Tumblr that encourages people to send you messages via your Tumblr email, which is different than direct messages/chats. While fans of your blog can use this feature to inform you of something, correct something you've posted, critique or even troll you, or simply send you some gushy love, for the most part, it's simply kept as "asks" because fans tend to ask you questions, hoping you'll answer them.

If you do, they can be either answered privately - just between you and the asker - or, more frequently, it is publicly answered. Public answers are posted on your Tumblr page like any other blog post. This helps the blogger answer questions for more fans who may have either asked the same question, or wanted to.

Anyway, my ask? It came shortly after I posted "Kisses": Do you have an ao3 account or a wattpad? I read one of your fics and I'd like to read some more.

So, of COURSE I publicly replied that I do have and AO3, and shared links to it, my FFN and DA accounts, and even promoted my original works a little by linking to my FictionPress account.

.....

And then about an hour later I realized that I was an idiot and should have used that opportunity to promote PT again... so I reblogged the ask with the link to that.

So I've been having more and more people stop by my Tumblr. I've expanded my audience. Granted, not by much; less than 100 people, but still, it's expanding. I've also had love for my stories, compliments about it, and I tried to use that momentum to promote PT more.

And yet the traffic to my story doesn't seem to showcase any of that... bummer. Hopefully with more "every third day" drabble posts along with my weekly updates to PT, I'll get more traffic flowing my way.

Ironically, this week I HAVE been getting a lot of notifications for new likes and follows.... for my "Hey, Arnold!" stories....
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
And if that STILL isn't enough writing for you? I've FINALLY figured out about 90% of the akuma I need for Friday's chapter update. Talk about last minute, right?

I had it mostly figured out so I could hint at it in chapter 8, but apparently I'm not subtle with my hints. Then again, fans of the show know by now "any random character that isn't part of the core cast that shows up is obviously getting akumatized, otherwise why bother introducing them?" So I guess I kept true to form in that case....

Michel Poirier is an environmentalist university student in his early 20s, and he becomes Terravenger. Trust me, that was the best name I came up with. I think it's about par with the other ones within the series... His goal is to revert Paris to an untamed jungle... well, forest, technically, because of the temperate environment, but "untamed jungle" has a better ring to it. I've also got a rough page-long synopsis of what happens thanks to the Snowflake Outline method created by Randy Ingermanson.



I still have some tweaks to do, namely the Lucky Charm. As of right now I have chopsticks that she uses to block the seed shooters mounted on the back of Terravenger's hands, but it seems a bit too simplistic. Sure, chopsticks aren't straight forward, but the second she sees the seed shooters she just needs to throw and use her luck to clog the shooters. I also need to better figure out CN's distractions. So I'm hoping my writing mojo spills over into this week.

At least I have a lot to talk about at group tonight. Which reminds me! After a small writers-block- induced hiatus, Omnibladestrike is back to writing again. I'm proud that the month away from the keyboard didn't deter him. Sometimes we just need time away for our brain to recharge and refind inspiration. Sometimes, like with Omni, we need to switch gears on what we're writing, at least for the time being.

Goodness! I still have so much more to talk about, including the update to my reading challenge, but this post is epically long; more so than usual. So I'm going to call it a week. Maybe I'll have time to talk about the reading challenge next week.

Finally, a shout out to my father's would-be 60th birthday this weekend. Love ya, Daddy!

Tuesday, May 15, 2018

Random Inspiration

Seems I'm officially back to only my regular readers. Ironically, the week I posted the first chapter of Peeping Tomcat, which was also the week season 2 of Miraculous premiered in America, was when I stopped getting 400+ weekly views. Oh well, it was a fun run while it lasted. And now I'm back to those of you who truly care about my writing.

It just seems a shame since 400+ readers seeing the weekly links to my writing would have been exciting.

Speaking of, you can find the seventh chapter of "Peeping Tomcat" in the normal three locations.
FanFiction         ArchiveOfOurOwn         DeviantArt

I still don't know how I feel about this chapter. I love the beginning of it. I enjoy the confusion Adrien has. Emotions, especially teenage emotions, are a jumbled incoherent mess. I'm just nervous that it was a bit TOO jumbled. Most of the second half of the chapter is inner turmoil instead of dialog or even action.

Eeeeeeh.... I don't know.

And it seems my readers aren't sure either, based on the 24-hr stats being a bit smaller than they have been....
FFN: 548 views, 2 faves, and 1 new follower
AO3: 197 views, 2 kudos, and 1 new review
DA: 19 views and one new fave

Total Results: 764 views, 5 faves, 1 follower, and 1 review

**NEW STAT**
Tumblr Notes:
7 likes

The AO3 review
 
**It's a bit of a lengthy review, which is mostly the reviewer talking about the parallels between Adrien stalking vs Marinette, and the double standard of how it's creepy when Adrien does it, but enduring when Mari does. It's nothing against my writing, though... so, yay?**
Real quick note on that "new stat" up there. As I mentioned last week, I revived my Tumblr blog. Last week I actually remembered to promote "Peeping Tomcat" on it, and I'm going to try to remember to promote my story updates and blog updates on my Tumblr from now on.

Well, between posting about "Peeping Tomcat" late Friday night, and my normal 24-hrs later check-in Saturday morning, I had seven people like my post. None of them - except for the darling ChibiSunnie - are one of my 24 followers. That's 6 new people to have found PT, and possibly 6 more views on AO3, which is the link I use on Tumblr to try to pump up my popularity there.

Anyway, this week's 24-hr stats aren't terrible, but they are the second-lowest since I started. The first week of PT had higher stats, then the low point of the second week, and then it's been over 845 - leaning closer to 900 - views each week. So seeing only 760 was a bit deflating. It was also the first week to see less than 7 new favorites within the first 24-hrs. Same goes for number of new followers. I usually get at least six. The views on FFN and AO3 individually are also among the lowest numbers since I started posting. DeviantArt views stayed at the new higher average, though, so there's that.

Since 8:30, Saturday morning, my stats have increased a little bit. Again, possibly because the latest episode of Miraculous didn't premiere until Saturday. They're now closer to my average.
FFN: 814 views, 5 faves, 4 followers, and 3 reviews
AO3: 308 views, 8 kudos, and the aforementioned review
DA: 29 views, 1 fave, and still no comments

Total Results: 1151 views, 14 faves, 4 followers, and 4 reviews

Tumblr Notes: 16 likes

FFN reviews:
  1. This was so lovely!
(by my now faithful reader Cassy1994 who has reviewed every chapter except for the first two)
  2. Awesome chapter! Your akuma was super creative, and the battle ended in a nice way. Also, I like that you delved deeper into Chloe’s personality great job! You write the characters really well as well!
(obviously a review of chapter 5 specifically)
  3. **See below for final review; it's lengthy**
At 1151, I have more views thus far this week than I did the entirety of the fifth week: the week that I posted my first akuma attack chapter. Since this story started gaining steam and averaging 1300 views a week, the Mimicker week seems to have been the weakest showing at only 1142 views. The weird thing is that it is tied for the most popular chapter over on DeviantArt, and is where most of the DA views come from. Chapter 2: Itch, being the runner up on DA.

Some other fun side-stats are:
  • FFN now has 72 total faves, and 72 is my favorite number.
  • AO3 is now up to 100 kudos! So, while FFN seems to be where I get more traffic, and love by way of followers and reviews, AO3 is by far more generous with kudos/faves.
  • I'm now up to 30 total reviews between both FFN and AO3.

Speaking of reviews, here's that third one from FFN:
Jowy's Pixie: Just spent all morning reading this story and wow! I'm officially hooked, I don't know why I didn't spot this story sooner, I'm annoyed that I didn't. But hey, at least I found it now.
      It's so nice to have found a Miraculous fanfic that looks deep into the characters' emotions and the descriptions of the world around them. It was awesome getting a glimpse into Adrien's mind throughout his - umm - little ordeal I guess? Haha. I really love this idea! It broke my heart reading about how Adrien longed to have a life and a family like Marinette's. Your characterisation of the characters is on point, especially Adrien and Marinette. Reading this fic is so believable, I feel like I'm reading real episodes of the show with every chapter which makes this story all the more enjoyable. Everyone turning into Chloe during that akuma attack was hilarious and I was laughing and smiling through that whole chapter.
      I'm very intrigued to see where you are going with this story. I have a pretty good idea which has me even more excited to read and if you surprise me, that's going to be even better. Adrien's exchange with Plagg at the end of this latest chapter was so sad to read. Adrien certainly seems so confused and lost right now. Poor little sunshine boy. Anyway, keep up the great work and I look forward to more! Good luck writing!
I really need to stop being
lazy and redo an Ugly Cry
face, because this one is
kinda scary...
So I'm now two for two for weekly reviews that make me want to glomp the reviewer through the screen. So sweet! My readers are the greatest people ever!!!!
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc
Thank you, Jowy, and thank you to every single one of my readers, even if you don't review! Just knowing you're out there, loving what I'm doing, fills my heart!
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc
Along those lines, I noticed that some of the more popular fanfic writers keep up their followers by posting a LOT of drabbles - usually daily, but sometimes multiple per day - on Tumblr. Just little scenes, stories, dialogues, whatever. One of the newly popular drabble forms is the "five sentence story". I am amazed at the people who can do them! I can't even keep up with Ronoxym's challenge for me to write a 1000-words-or-less flash fiction.

Anyway, I was listening to "Mayday" by TheFatRat, and the song just threw a randomly dark fanfic concept into my head.
I wondered "what if this song was an akumatized supervillain singing it?" Kind of similar to the idea someone used to convert a song about the game "Five Nights at Freddy's" into an equally appropriate song about akumatized supervillains.
Basically, the supervillain is calling out for help. She doesn't want to be akumatized. She doesn't want to use the powers she was given for any sort of "leveling the playing field" like all of Hawk Moth's victims. The thing there though is while two characters - Aurore and Miss Bustier - may have starting off fighting the akuma, in the end they AGREED to accept the "gift" of Hawk Moth granting them powers. Once they were akumatized they loved their supervillain persona. The supervillain from this past week, Frightningale, even commented "I won't let you take my akuma away. I like the new me, and I'm here to stay."

So why would the akuma I'm thinking of plead for Ladybug and Cat Noir to purify her? Going back to Miss Bustier, after getting purified she lamented being a supervillain. It was clear throughout the whole episode that she did not want to become akumatized in the slightest. If that's true, then what makes my original akuma idea different? What sets her apart so that she actively wants to get rid of her powers? And why can't she trick Hawk Moth into taking them back?

In a handful of episodes, when a supervillain goes rogue and doesn't follow Hawk Moth's goal of capturing LB's and CN's Miraculous, Hawk Moth has threatened to take the akuma back and remove their powers. If my original supervillain wanted to get rid of her powers, why can't she just sit still and not do anything to attempt to get the earrings or ring?

Then I thought about a Justice League Unlimited episode: "Epilogue". If you don't know what I'm talking about, you should try to track it down, and have a tissue handy.

There's this whole plot dealing with Terry McGinnis talking with Amanda Waller, whom most might now know as the woman in charge of the Suicide Squad's missions, among a slew of other things. Terry rages about Bruce Wayne, and how he doesn't want to end up just as cold, uncaring, and alone simply because he's the new Batman. Amanda then tells Terry a story about a time when Batman was the only one in the Justice League who managed to peacefully end a conflict due to his empathy. She hoped it would show Terry that while Bruce is disconnected from people for a reason, his compassion is still there.

This story-within-a-story part of the episode is what inspired me when I thought about "Mayday" and it being an akuma supervillain singing it.

In the flash back to Bruce still being Batman, a powerful girl codenamed Ace is terrorizing a city - I think it's Metropolis - and so the Justice League is called in. Ace is still fairly young, maybe about 14 or so, and has spent her life being fairly cruelly experimented on to test her reality-altering powers. I can't recall if it ends up being a side effect of the experiments or if it was unrelated, but Ace ends up growing brain tumors that are rapidly killing her. In her childlike panic, she creates a sort of Wonderland within the city, but Amanda informed Batman that the tumors were going to cause a brain aneurysm at any moment, and the resulting psychic backlash would cause massive destruction and loss of life.

Amanda felt the only solution was to kill Ace before the aneurysm. Unbeknownst to the rest of the Justice League, Batman had no intentions of ever doing so. He managed to become isolated from his team, and calmly approached Ace. She lamented the loss of her childhood due to the experimentation and training, and the fact that she wouldn't be able to experience normal life since she didn't have much longer to live. Bruce empathized with her, and her telepathic abilities let her know he knew exactly what it was like to lose your childhood so young. In his calm, compassion, and empathy, along with his willingness to stay with her so she wouldn't die alone, Ace became less afraid of the end. When she had the aneurysm, she was at peace, and so the psychic backlash didn't happen. Instead, everything returned to normal.

While I don't know if I'll to the same extreme as JLU and have my akumatized supervillain peacefully die, I did want those extreme, traumatized emotions to be what makes her different from Hawk Moth's other targets. She didn't feel slighted, wronged, or rejected. She didn't have a bad day. She is constantly fighting with depression or PTSD or suicidal thoughts or something along those lines that isn't the "easy fix" that Ladybug and Cat Noir usually go up against.

I also planned on having Hawk Moth accidentally akumatize her, since it's happened before - see: episodes "Gigantitan" and "Zombizou" and even "Despair Bear" to an extent - I was going to have HM try to akumatize someone else, but the akuma found our poor victim instead. Her negative emotions being a much stronger beacon for the magical bug.

I don't have all the details figured out, and I definitely want to finish off the WIPs I already have on my plate first. However, as one of those enticing drabbles authors post on Tumblr to promote themselves, I did share the scene I wrote when Hawk Moth discovers he can't control the girl, or remove the akuma from her.

You can check out my tease on my Tumblr page:
Fused Akuma

I didn't bother noting the 24-hr mark, but as of this posting I'm up to 11 notes. Nine are likes, and again, none of them seem to be people who are following me anyway, so they somehow found me kind of out of the blue. Yay, Tumblr tags! The other two notes were people reblogging my story. One of those reblogs was by one of the 9 people who liked the story, and they also added "Oh my god! So good!" when they reblogged it. Technically, there's a 12th note, but that's just me thanking the person for the reblog and comment.

Now, 11 notes on a post is barely peanuts on Tumblr, and two reblogs aren't going to really puff up my visibility on the site. However, the fact that even that many people found me is so cool to me. I know that I'm new to the site, and therefore I'm bottom of the totem pole. Everyone has tens, if not hundreds, of people they already follow, so finding me is quite the task.

Plus, it's just a little something. Nothing major, and nothing incredibly emotional - either in the warm fuzzy, or heart-wrenching senses.

I'll have to work more on getting at least a small bit of writing done to post semi-frequently on Tumblr in order to start getting the traffic the big-names get.

Alright, so my checklist has become:
  • Edit the next chapter of Peeping Tomcat so it's ready to publish each Friday
  • Write something new to post outside of PT each month
  • Get the draft of "One and the Same" done before I'm finished posting PT so there isn't much of a lag between stories.
  • Finish re-reading "Ready Player One" and get started on Rick Riordan's latest Trials of Apollo story "The Burning Maze"
  • And now write semi-daily shorts to periodically post on my Tumblr to try to drum up traffic.
*wipes brow*
Being a writer is hard work! It's a good thing we FINALLY have some nice weather. This was actually my view while writing my post this morning:
Well.... at least, it was my view from 7am until 10. Then it just opened up in a massive downpour coupled with thunder so loud it not only rocked my apartment a couple of times, but it sounds like buildings are coming down around me! Those clouds are LOUD when they sumo wrestle up there!

Still, I always found thunder storms kind of soothing. Might be good "stay home and write" weather.

Oh, and one more thing, since Mother's Day was this past Sunday in the US.
#Humblebrag.
Love you, Mom!

Tuesday, May 8, 2018

It's Been A Good Week

How are you beautiful people doing? What's that? Oh, why yes. Yes I am in a very chipper mood, and let me tell you why.

Come. Come walk with me...

So, as per usual, Friday was my weekly update of Peeping Tomcat. It was my second-longest chapter to date. At least, within this story. Clocked in a little over 7200 words, and with barely any dialogue in it, I was getting nervous that this would be my weakest chapter.

I was stressing out and a bit panicked as I spent all of last week trying to edit the chapter. Trying to chop it down. Trying to add dialogue. Trying to make sure I wasn't repeating myself - either by repeating something from earlier in the story, or stating something better used later in the story.

As I got closer and closer to my breaking point, I got a new review on my AO3 publication of PT.

DeathBunnii: Really love the way you write Adrien's POV and thought process.

That was exactly the review I needed at just about the exact time I needed it.

The sixth chapter was pretty much exclusively Adrien's POV and thought process, at least for the back half of the chapter. Having someone telling me that I did that well really helped me get excited about the chapter again.

I still think this is the weakest of my chapters because of how little dialogue there is on the back half, but it's such a crucial chapter as well, so I'm proud of it.

FanFiction         ArchiveOfOurOwn         DeviantArt

The rest of Friday went by, and I tried to not fixate on the number of hits, faves, follows, and/or reviews I got. It was hard, especially since I didn't really have much of an alternative distraction. Soon enough, though, it was 8:30am on Saturday, and it had been 24hours since I published the latest chapter. Check out these stats.

FFN: 672 views, 2 faves, 6 followers, and 1 review
AO3: 221 views and 9 kudos
DA: 12 views and 1 fave

Total Results: 905 views, 12 faves, 6 followers, and 1 review

The new review:
   So close to guessing the truth and he still misses!
As a point of reference, these were my week-long stats for the previous chapter "Mimicker":
FFN: 875 views, 4 faves, 7 followers, and 4 reviews
AO3: 227 views, 5 kudos, 1 bookmark, and 1 review
DA: 40 views(!) and 2 faves

Total Results: 1142 views, 11 faves, 8 followers, and 5 reviews
Real quick about last week's stats. I gathered up 88 more views and one more follower on FFN between my update on Tuesday and my posting "Parallels" Friday morning. On AO3 I got another 36 hits and one new kudos in that same time frame, plus Bunnii's review. DeviantArt dropped off with only five more views, but that random spike is still cool.

Point is, check out the number of views, faves, and followers I got for the entire week after I posted "Mimicker" versus just the first 24hours after posting "Parallels". Cool, huh? I think I really am picking up steam!

Now, let's check out how I've done for the rest of the week thus far.

Normally, I like to update these stats for the moment I post this blog. However, I'm going to keep them as the stats I had the moment I wrote this part of the post. Mostly because, at the moment I'm writing this, I have exactly 7400 views of "Peeping Tomcat", and I think that's so cool!

Anyway, between my posting at 8:30 Friday morning until my writing this bit at 8:30 this morning - so, exactly 96 hours since posting - I had the following stats for this week's update:
FFN: 1174 views(!), 5 faves, 13 followers, and 2 reviews
AO3: 293 views, 12 kudos, 2 bookmarks, and 1 new review
DA: 15 views, 1 fave, but no comments

Total Results: 1482 views, 18 faves, 15 followers, and 3 reviews

The new FFN review was:
 this was really great to see Chat being so reflective about his hobby[sic]
I've already surpassed what I did last week! Heck, just FFN alone basically surpassed the entirety of last week! But I really want to focus on my reviews for a moment.

The one new review I received on AO3 was on Saturday evening. And it just made my week.

Kuro22: Dude, seriously, I feel like there isn't enough people telling you how well-written this fic is.
           I usually HATE first pov fics but this one is....simply so so good????? I really love the train of thought you build, the pace of the fic and, even with no dialogue, we readers feel drawn to this story.
           I am very much looking forward to future chapters, thank you for writing this and sharing it with us!!!
I know, this looks strangely worse
than the actual meme pic...
I wanted to cry. I wanted to ugly cry so bad.

That opening line is what killed me: "I feel like there isn't enough people telling you how well-written this fic is."

I was excited for the 26 reviews I have received between AO3 and FFN. I was happy to receive the 5 reviews I did have over on AO3. I don't want to diminish from any of them at all. But the sheer fact that this person felt that I deserved more love just made my heart swell.
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
The added bonus was that Kuro22 stated that they normally "HATE" first person. I'm not entirely sure why so many people hate this POV, but I do hear it frequently. Anyway, the sheer fact that the person saw "I" in narration, but decided to give it a chance anyway humbles me to no end. Then, to KEEP READING and to say that I did it "so so good"....
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
A writer's ego is a delicate thing, and Kuro22 just armored it! So, if you are somehow reading this, Kuro, THANK YOU!!!
Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
Okay, seriously, I need to stop being lazy and create my own icons so I can stop stealing from this Hacker Girl sticker collection.... but she's just so perfect for me.
Ya-Ya Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.
Okay, I'll stop.

Anyway, as much as I loved Kuro22's review, and as much as it made my week, and as much as I keep going back to re-read it to try to get me psyched for the next chapter, I also feel guilty about loving this ONE review so much.

For instance, the other review I got, over on FanFiction.Net, after that initial 24hours, was by cassy1994. It was done roughly at the same time: Saturday night. I don't want to dismiss that person's review, because Cassy has been commenting on nearly every chapter of PT. Seeing this person's name pop up time and time again, proving that I have faithful readers, also means the world to me.

In truth, every review does. Even one of my first ones that corrected a bit of my grammar. I learned something. I improved. It was the definition of a constructive criticism.

Then there are the "simple" ones that are a brief "I love this" or "Please, keep going" or "I can't wait until next update!"

These reviews make my heart swell as well. They truly do. They humble me. They reward me. They push me to keep going. They remind me that people DO like my work. The simplest words mean so much, because it means my work moved someone enough that they felt compelled to tell me so.

So, while I'm gushing over Kuro22's review, I feel guilty about not doing the same with my other reviews. I don't want to take any of those reviews for granted. I don't want to de-value a single one.

It takes a surprising amount of effort to take the time to write a comment/review on someone's story; even the "simple" ones.

So, if you are one of my readers who has left a review, know that they each touch my heart and I am grateful for every last one, no matter how long or short or well written or jumbled English it is. Heck, I may not know exactly what to make of it, but even those goofy "AKDSKFOSHEHS!!!!" type reviews are welcomed. It just means I somehow moved you - or broke your brain - to the point of not coming up with something comprehensible, but you still felt compelled to tell me so.

Okay. Enough gushing, I think. Let's get back to my writing.

Namely, those stats!

I just want to point out how much they have jumped since that initial 24hours after updating.
FFN: 502 views
AO3: 72 views
DA: 3 views

Total Results: 577 views
Normally it just kind of peters out after that first burst. However, this week it seems to still be going strong, which is awesome.

I think part of that might be because the latest episode of "Miraculous Ladybug" finally premiered. That 14th episode that was supposed to come out two weeks ago on Disney UK? Yeah, apparently there was some sort of scheduling miscommunication, and instead it premiered on Disney Spain this past Saturday. It nearly simulcasted with the English dub though, so English speakers didn't have to wait too long for a version we could understand. Although, I do admit that I tried REALLY hard to remember ANYTHING from the six years of Spanish I took between middle school and college so I didn't have to wait for the English translation.

Man, I hate my brain sometimes. Could never really comprehend Spanish, even after all that studying. Add in that I haven't taken a class in about 15yrs....

Anyway, as I theorized before, I continue to believe that new episodes completely spike potential fanfiction readership, even if said fanfic doesn't relate to the latest episode.

On top of that, though, and possibly the reason my AO3 readership is finally starting to slowly grow, I have revived my Tumblr account.

Surprise, surprise. I'm LycoRogue on there as well.
Inside the Tree Trunk

The blog title relates to an old D&D character of mine: Pamela Sheppard, AKA Ariana Snow. Ariana had a nymph admirer who happened to be the high priestess of Ariana's goddess. So, Ari flirted back with the priestess, and the goddess rewarded this (?) by gifting her a magical tree trunk by the nymph's pond. Ari could use a special knock to open up the trunk and use it for storage of her most treasured items. Figured it was basically what I'd be doing on Tumblr.... Minus the special knock.

I don't post anything original all that frequently, but I'm trying to become fairly active in the Miraculous fandom. I reblog frequently. I like more frequently. I try to comment as often as possible.

I then realized, when one of the people I follow promoted the latest chapter of her story, that I'm an idiot and should TOTALLY promote PT on Tumblr. I've also noticed that more and more Tumblr bloggers post/read fanfiction to AO3 than they do to FFN. So, when trying to decide which link to use to promote PT, I went with the AO3 link. Get more people to find me there.

I think it's been working. At the very least, six people have liked the post I shared promoting my story. Maybe that's six more people who found PT that wouldn't have otherwise. Well.... five more people, the sixth one was ChibiSunnie, and I know she's ready to read the story once she has the free time again.

I'll have to keep remembering to promote to Tumblr. Try to garnish more traffic that way.

But wait, because we're not through yet!

Chapter 7 needs a bit more polishing here and there, but was more-or-less ready to post weeks ago. So I was able to use the past few days to focus more on my future writing than focusing on editing this next chapter.

First up? I used that Snowflake Outline method created by Randy Ingermanson to start figuring out "One and the Same" finally.

I have to admit that this sequel to "Peeping Tomcat" is going to be a bit more complicated than I originally thought, now that I'm plotting it out.

First of all, I can't tie it to "You've Got Mail" as directly as I originally thought, as I mentioned last week. Secondly, Ingermanson's structure suggests "three disasters and an ending" for story structure. It would be the equivalent of the concluding conflict of Act I, the mid-Act-II conflict, and the concluding Act II conflict: the climax. Then the ending, in Ingermanson's version, is the entirety of Act III.

Coming up with these "three disasters" is proving tricky. I was thinking of having Cat Noir confess that he knows who Ladybug truly is in an attempt to get her to let him reveal who he is to her. It doesn't go well, obviously. The snag though, is I don't know if I want this to be the climactic conflict just before she finds out that Cat Noir is Adrien and is thrilled that she no longer has to be torn between the two men. Because in "You've Got Mail" and even the original "Little Shop Around the Corner" there is a LOT of conflicting emotions in the concluding reveal of who the female lead's pen-pal is. One of those emotions is the sudden realization that if NY152 was Joe this whole time, then when she was talking about NY152 to Joe he was lying to her by not admitting that was him. It also means that he knew who ShopGirl was that whole time and also didn't say anything.

Do I keep that reveal for Marinette? Do I take that part away by having CN admit that he knows who she is? Do I keep it at the end of the story so Marinette has to process that CN knows who LB is AND process that CN and Adrien are the same person all within a few minutes of each other? OOOOOOOr, do I make that my "second disaster" in the middle of Act II? Have her "hate" Cat Noir the way Kathleen hated Joe, so that the re-connect and friendship build also heals the trust between them? Is that too much? Rebuilding trust while also building a romance? I mean, it was done in "You've Got Mail"....????

GAAAH! I'm not sure how I want to attack this story. I might have to switch over to fixing the Devon/Trish battle story instead of flowing directly from "Peeping Tomcat" into "One and the Same".

On the other plus side, I think I've FINALLY figured out my second original akuma attack for chapter 9 of PT.

The show "Miraculous Ladybug" has a lot of nods to pop culture. There are the (not so) subtle nods to classic Hollywood monsters: zombies, King Kong, Invisible Man. Homages to other Hollywood blockbusters: RogerCop instead of RoboCop, a scene where Pixelator asks for Jagged Stone is nearly shot-for-shot from The Shining, the Gorizilla episode also had a near shot-for-shot recreation of King Kong on the top of the Empire State Building. There's inspiration taken from fairy tales, myths, and legends: Befana, Santa Claus, Greek sirens, Cupid, Sapotis. The hints of Marvel and DC comics are also evident: Ladybug is Spider-Man, Cat Noir could be equated to the same-named Black Cat from the Spider-Man franchise as well, Alya's original superhero idol was the American comic book hero Majestia who resembled both Supergirl and Captain Marvel, Dark Owl is supposed to be Batman, and I could probably even equate Hawk Moth with Mr. Freeze from the Batman franchise. Finally, even TV shows/video games are parodied: the bots in Ultimate Mecha Strike III are all pulled from pop culture, the mech attacks mimic those of 90s fighter games, and Kung Food's outfit resembles Goku's from the Dragonball Z series.

With all this pop culture referenced throughout the series, I figured "why not use more from comic books?" I've seen plenty of cartoons that have a villain trying to fight as a voice for nature/Mother Nature/the Earth, etc. However, in just about all of the cartoons I've seen this trope, it's always a female character sort of taking on a role as the avatar for Mother Nature. It works. I get it. Also, females tend to be named after plants more than males, so coming up with names like Poison Ivy is easy.

Well, I wanted my second akumatized villain to be a male, to balance things out since, while males seem to get akumatized more on the show, female akumas seem to be super popular in the fanfiction/fanart. Anyway, I figured "why not have a male equivalent to Poison Ivy?" Having an environmentalist become akumatized and try to return Paris "to nature" was fairly simple, and won't need as much backstory or resolution as a lot of my other ideas. I could give the original citizen a quick nod and introduction in chapter 8, and then have the battle in chapter 9, and try to nod back to him in later chapters, like I'm trying to do with Louise.

In truth, the "post-akumatization" for Louise and this new akuma probably won't really come up, but I'm trying because fans want to know these guys are okay. That's one of the critiques of the show: that not everything that caused the akuma in the first place is entirely resolved - or at least shown as resolved - by the end of the episode.

Anyway, I've got the skeleton of this male Poison Ivy started. I gave him the name Michel, because it seems distinctly French, and no one seems to have used it yet. He's going to be in his early 20s, possibly still a college student. I have his powers mostly figured out, as well as his costume. It's going to be gloriously Power Rangers/Sailor Moon like. I just need to figure out his supervillain name. Not many poisonous plants lend themselves to a male persona. The top runner right now is Mandrake. Mostly because it has the word "man" in it, and "Drake" is a masculine name. However, compared to the other akuma supervillain names, "Mandrake" seems awkward. I'll have to workshop it a bit.

Whoo! This blog post is just going on forever, isn't it!? I told you I had a good week.

I should probably get back to writing my fiction, though. And I'm sure you've given me enough of your time already this week. So, until next Tuesday!